55 Hours To Buenos Aires

All you busy folks with real jobs and lives keep saying that you just want some time to think your thoughts and come to understandings, but I can now definitively say that after 55 hours on a bus I have no thoughts left to think at all, and no profound realizations to extol. I now know that one can actually become motion sick from sitting down in a cafe and NOT seeing things rush past outside the window, and that most of the part of Northern Argentina that links up with Tarija is pretty, but uninteresting. That`s where Rush Hour 3, The Marine 2, and 10 hours of the bus uniting telenovela Corazon Salvaje come in, I suppose. And at least 7 of those hours were spent just getting across the border and then through the following 5 identical security checkpoints all paced about 20 minutes apart on the highways of Northern Argentina. Nothing like bureaucratic transactions at 4am to reaffirm the ridiculous nature of borders and nations, and the consistency of corruption in low level positions. I was feeling very much like a co-sufferer along with my 100% Bolivian bus group, until we hit the checkpoints. There, my passport was both an invitation to mild ridicule and an easy pass out of any real inspection. Though my light ray based water purifier (I was camping in Mexico!) and my bottles of prescription meds inspired a lot of smug chuckling (where´s she from- the states?) I didn´t have to unpack anything or put up with the insistent derogatory questioning the other folks had to deal with.

55 hour nest

I thought coming back to BA would feel a little more like coming home- I did live here, after all, but mostly it seems just like any other huge city... Seeing my old friends again is wonderful though, and I have a tiny space in a tiny bed in a tiny apartment, so I`m all set! And that`s really the idea, after all. Seeing folks. We have an american queer dj to see spin, a drummer celebration to attend, a Colombian birthday party, and who knows what other strange and largely improbable places to end up. Plus 3 years of local politics to catch up on. And onwards!

ps- keep your eyes out for a guest post on some Bolivia adventures, and a snapfishlink to photos of the crazy boat and motorcycle trip I took last month to the Bolivian Amazon!